Conventional computerized devices, such as personal computers, laptop computers, and the like utilize graphical user interfaces in applications, such as operating systems, and graphical editors (i.e., web page editors, document editors, etc.) that enable users to quickly provide input and create documents and/or projects using “What You See Is What You Get” (WYSIWYG) technology. In general, using a graphical user interface, a user operates an input device such as a mouse or keyboard to manipulate graphical objects on a computer display. The graphical objects are often represented as icons, and the user can operate an input device such as a mouse to move a mouse pointer onto an icon (i.e., graphically overlapping the icon) on the graphical user interface. By depressing a mouse button, the application (such as the operating system desktop) selects the icon, and if the user maintains the mouse button in a depressed state, the user can drag the icon across the graphical user interface. By releasing the mouse button, the icon is placed on the graphical user interface at the current position of the mouse pointer.
Using graphical user interface technology, users can create and update documents (i.e., web pages, brochures, etc) and/or projects, such as a editing a Digital Video Disk (DVD), by dragging and dropping graphical objects (i.e., video clips, etc) into the project via an authoring tool.
A DVD project is produced by linking together video clips. Video clips are comprised of a plurality of video frames. Generally, a user (creating the DVD) will select a single frame that is representative of the video clip(s) as a ‘poster image’ (also referred to as a ‘poster frame’). The poster frame is a frame from the plurality of video frames that best represents the content of the plurality of video frames within the video clip. The user reviews the frames within a video clip (or multiple video clips), and visually assesses the frame that best represents the video clip(s). The poster image presents ‘a picture is worth a thousand words’ representation of the content of the DVD or video clip. In the case where a user is creating a timeline comprised of multiple video clips, each of the video clips can have its own poster image, making it easier for the user to identify each video clip while manipulating a plurality of video clips within the DVD authoring tool.